


Amenities

by thisprettywren



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Community: thegameison_sh, Dark, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-05
Updated: 2011-11-05
Packaged: 2017-10-25 17:45:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/273048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisprettywren/pseuds/thisprettywren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mrs Hudson would see that her Sherlock got what he needed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Amenities

**Author's Note:**

> An expanded version of my entry for Cycle 4, Round 2 at [thegameison_sh](thegameison_sh.livejournal.com). The prompt this round was "out of the ordinary."

If someone had told her that morning that she would find anything about that day significant except that George--her George--was sentenced to execution, she would have laughed.

That afternoon she met Sherlock Holmes.

In retrospect, Martha Hudson couldn’t honestly say which had changed her life more.

***

He’d been collected and imperious, nearly snide, while he testified to the evidence that George’s murder of Henry Short had been premeditated. Afterward she found herself thinking about the way his pale eyes had locked on her face while he talked, wondering what it was he hoped to read there.

She didn’t know what made her look him up upon her return to London, but with a name like that he wasn’t exactly hard to find. They met for coffee, on neutral ground. He seemed different, somehow, than she remembered him. At loose ends.

In the end, she’d invited him back to hers for a cup of tea. Poor thing, he was so thin; he needed someone to look after him.

***

She knew when it was time: long periods of silence from the first floor punctuated by the tortured sounds of the violin, the nice doctor’s footsteps sounding heavier on the stairs.

At first she’d just brought him the papers, pointed out potential cases that she hoped would catch his interest. A robbery, a forgery. An acquaintance’s husband being blackmailed.

“Dull. Obvious. _Boring._ ”

It stung, more than it had when he first moved in and she’d find the dinners she prepared still sitting on the table the next morning, untouched. That was before she understood him, of course.

Poor Sherlock, her Sherlock. He might be eating better now, but he was still bored, so dreadfully bored that all of London couldn’t entertain him.

All of London didn’t know him like she did. She’d brought him into her home; he was hers to care for, now. She’d see that he got what he needed.

Next time she’d just have to try harder.

 

***

Sometimes she’d bring him cases from the papers that she disguised as her own problems, or a friend’s, leaving out pieces of information to make it more interesting. Before long she became quite adept at recognising which details were crucial, which omissions would make a case more difficult to solve, which would make it impossible.

What evidence would need to be eliminated to ensure that no one would ever solve the case at all.

She supposed it did her as much good as it did Sherlock, coming up with new and inventive ways to challenge him. She wasn’t getting any younger, after all. She was a pragmatist: she’d lowered her hemlines years ago, took her vitamins every day, and now she’d found a way to keep her mind sharp.

From there it was easy, a natural progression from finding challenges to creating them. It was incredibly simple, for someone like her; so ordinary, apparently above suspicion. Trustworthy.

An unconventional way to care for someone, true, but then, she’d never been overly concerned with convention. She only wanted the best for Sherlock, and her best is what she gave him.

Custom-made puzzles, just for him.

***

There it was again, heavy steps on the stairs. The poor doctor, such a nice man, but he didn’t know Sherlock like she did. Not yet, anyway. She’s seen it in his face, after they came home that first night; in time, he might be able to do for Sherlock what she did for him.

In the meantime, she didn’t mind. She knew how to take care of her boys, and it kept the repair bills down.

She dried her hands on a towel, grabbed the evening paper and started up the stairs, already suppressing a smile in anticipation of seeing Sherlock’s face light up.

It had been easier than she thought it would be, taking a life. She wondered, idly, if that should trouble her conscience more.

“Look, Sherlock. A nice murder; that ought to cheer you up.”

The upward quirk of his mouth told her she’d done well.

***

When she saw the doctor’s account of that nasty business with the pills, she couldn’t help but be pleased. _Sherlock Holmes sees through everyone and everything, but what’s amazing is how spectacularly ignorant he is about some things._

She smiled to herself. “Not everyone, dear.”

It made her feel special to be the one puzzle Sherlock couldn’t solve. She wondered what he would do if he ever found out. But sometimes, when it was late enough that she could deny it even to herself, it hollowed her stomach in a way that felt almost like anger; to be so invisible that even the great Sherlock Holmes couldn’t see her for what she was, that the effort she put in would go unrecognised.

She could show him, of course. He wouldn’t snap at her then, wouldn’t be so dismissive, not once--

Well.

Poor dear, it really was hard on him, the boredom. It ate away at him. She could see it in his face--so tired--and always so dreadfully thin.

He just needed someone to look after him.

She knew how to make the boredom go away for a good long time, of course; still had her trump card, but she hoped she wouldn’t have to play it it for a while. A nice puzzle for him, unsolvable and terribly, wonderfully interesting.

 _Remove the right detail...._

Still. She’d save it for when she truly needed it. For when _Sherlock_ truly needed it.

It would keep him entertained for months. Years, perhaps. He’d want to know what happened to his doctor, after all. It was very nearly a pity--such a nice man--but no use fussing over what couldn’t be helped.

Sherlock was hers to care for.

She’d see that he got what he needed.


End file.
